CHENNAI: Soon, giant digital LED billboards with advertisements flashing, will dot the city and state as the government has framed fresh rules for setting them up.

The rules have been framed for corporations, municipalities and town panchayats with necessary restrictions, while corporation commissioners and heads of the local bodies concerned have been given the power to scrutinise applications and act on irregularities.

Hoardings and billboards can now come up at bridges, flyovers, bus stands, terminuses, parks, playgrounds, railway stations, railway land (visible to public), parking lots, toilets and construction sites. The license would be valid for three years and must be renewed two years before the expiry. The government has allowed scrolling of printed displays with a dwell time of 10 seconds and transition time of one second, while prohibiting animated displays and moving videos in busy areas.

The design has to be approved by the corporations and the local bodies concerned. The application fee for hoardings would be 2,000 for the corporation and the licence fee 6,000. The fee can be increased by upto 20% for LED or LCD advertisements.

Further, the corporation can provide its land to set up hoardings and billboards, at a concession fee of 14% of the guideline value of the land, enabling a revenue boost for the corporation.

Civic activist Dayanand Krishnan called for mandatory stability checks for the hoardings and billboards. "This is a welcome move to regularise the set-up but the rules must be enforced strictly. There should be adequate stability checks for the hoardings and the building carrying it to withstand a 150 kmph cyclone," he said. This initiative, he added, will bring in good revenue for corporations and local bodies.

Some others opposed the move. "Firstly, they don't do stability checks for buildings properly. We have seen instances of hoardings and banners falling, putting people in danger. Further, it will affect the visibility of passersby," said David Manohar, a civic activist.